Betabrand Presents: Flashback Jacket & Occasional Dress

Today, Betabrand is proud to introduce the limited-edition Flashback Jacket, our unique take on a forgotten fashion staple known as the San Francisco Hunting Coat.

Hunting in San Francisco? It’s a flashback to an earlier, wilder time in the Bay Area, when the forest teemed with all manner of exotic and deadly wildlife, including poisonous flying sloths, the Saber-Toothed Sequoia, and, most notorious of all, the Golden Gato: a ferocious, six-legged feline abomination that disemboweled Forty-Niners by the hundreds in order to steal and later devour their gold nuggets.

(Historical note: this creature’s unquenchable thirst for precious metal so imperiled the local economy, desperate city leaders built the Golden Gate Bridge to lure it into the hills of Marin County, where it is rumored to live even today.)

We took this classic coat design and updated it in soft, subtly ribbed Bedford corduroy with a natural mossy color, to compliment the traditional backing of fine orange twill. (This “flashback” feature was originally intended as a safety precaution; several hunters soon discovered that, ironically, the color orange causes the Golden Gato to fly into an unstoppable, murderous rage.)

As a final touch, we fortified the jacket shoulders with military-style epaulets. Why? As every good hunter knows, moose, sasquatch and other large game usually yield without a struggle if they sense the presence of an authority figure.

Want more information on the new Flashback Jacket? Just roll over the Design Specs button on the product page.

For Her: The Occasional Dress (In Rose Or Teal)

We designed our new satin-and-lace Occasional Dress to strike a beautiful balance between casual and elegant. It's got the same free-spirited DNA as our Elope Dress, so you know it's ready to make any special occasion even better.

While we ultimately leave the definition of "special" up to you, our fashion engineers have compiled a brief guide to the relative social appropriateness of this garment: